This invention relates to information management systems and, more particularly, to a system for use by airlines or other travel industry companies to determine recommended booking levels.
Common carriers, for example airlines, take advance reservations and book passengers on flights up to a predetermined booking level. Once this number of passengers is reached, the flight is deemed to be closed.
It is common practice for airlines to overbook flights to some extent. This is done because, often, some of the passengers with reservations do not actually take the flight. Thus, without overbooking, the flight would depart at less than capacity.
The overbooking level is generally expressed as a percent, greater than 100%, of the capacity of the aircraft. Each individual carrier sets its own overbooking levels based primarily on experience. A different overbooking level is set for each closed flight for each day of the week between each pair of cities. Consequently, many different overbooking levels must be determined by the airline. Of course, the overbooking level is a moot point for flights that never or rarely close.
By overbooking the flight, the carrier seeks to maximize its profits by using the total capacity of the vehicle. However, if the overbooking level is set too high, some of the passengers booked on the flight will be "bumped" from the flight, i.e. will not be seated because there are fewer "no shows" than passengers booked. This inconveniences passengers who may become dissatisfied with the carrier. Thus, while trying to maximize profits, most carriers try to minimize the number of "bumped" passengers.
Determination of the optimal overbooking level is complicated further by the fact that carriers often transport groups in addition to regular passengers. In general, however, since group booking is irregular, it should not be considered when determining the best overbooking level.
Also relevant is the number of standby passengers that are boarded on the flight and the number of standby passengers that are waiting but who cannot be boarded because the plane is full. If a flight regularly has stand-by passengers at the gate, the overbooking level need not be set as high as one that does not. So, determination of the optimal booking level should take the number of stand-bys into account.
As noted above, overbooking levels are generally decided by individuals based on past experience with a particular flight. In some cases, a carrier has partly automated this process by collecting information useful in determining the overbooking level using a computer and then having experienced individuals review the information to determine the best overbooking level. However, no one has previously devised a system for gathering information, storing the information, and using the information to automatically determine the optimal overbooking level and to adjust previously computed overbooking levels quickly based on new information in the manner described herein.